The Promised Land III: Deus ex Memoria
by LadyElaine
Summary: Fifty years after the events of 'Second Sight', Jack and her twin sons receive unexpected visitors.
1. Eclipse

Title: Deus Ex Memoria  
  
Author: LadyElaine  
  
Disclaimer: The characters and situations of "Pitch Black" belong to USA Films and David Twohy. Ishmael and other original characters are mine.  
  
Rating: R for language and violence  
  
Summary: Fifty years after the events of "Second Sight", Jack and her twin sons receive unexpected visitors.  
  
Note: I have a terrible weakness for well-crafted original characters. On that note, Jules and Ardath--the twins are for you.  
  
  
  
  
  
Deus Ex Memoria  
  
  
  
Prologue  
  
Ishmael sunk its talons into the soft, moist earth above Kat's grave.  
  
It had been three decades since the colony ship from Janus had landed on the unsettled world known only as TH11X38; they had named it Darklin, and they called it home. Now Ishmael could look forward to a month in faster- than-light time, a jump of twenty years in real time, as its people once again left their home to search. Thirty years in this new place: for Kat, it had been thirty years of bearing children to Moshe Ibrahim--Moses--her chosen mate. The marriage had been a practical one, a union only for the sake of offspring.  
  
The knowledge that Kat had died worn out and in pain stirred a long-ago memory in Kat's old companion. Dark wings stirred in Ishmael's soul, whispering of agony and anger and fearful challenges. Its physical wings rustled against the remembered torture of being ruined by its older opponent. Three decades had gone by on Darklin; how many years since Ishmael had last thought on that ancient battle?  
  
The soil around its talons was cold and damp. Even if it had meant to dig Kat's body up, Ishmael wouldn't expect to find anything. The deep, black jungles of Darklin were always hungry.  
  
  
  
I. Eclipse  
  
It was Jack who found him--or, rather, found his body. He had wandered down from the pueblo sometime in the middle of the night; the bruises decorating his skin said he'd tumbled a good part of the way. Riddick was collapsed against the cliff face, stuffed behind a stone. Flecks of spittle glistened on his lips and chin. The rock wall bore a crimson stain from where Riddick had been repeatedly thumping his head against it for who knew how long. Jack barely even glanced at the matching crimson wound on his scalp--she'd seen more than enough of his blood in the years they'd been together.  
  
It took three hours for her to drag his body all the way back up to their house. It took much longer for her to realize that he was never coming home. She never told anyone what had happened, but before long, the whole pueblo knew that Richard B. Riddick was gone. She was happy to let the rest of the galaxy remain in ignorance, to let them search the hundred worlds for a man they would never find.  
  
Jack didn't mind the stories that quickly sprang up around her family. Like greenery after the rains, the rumors were gone almost as soon as they'd appeared, only to be replaced with the dry silence no one wanted to break. His absence was almost as tangible as his presence had been. Afterwards, the water from the Riddick family condensers was said to be bitter, and few would trade for it.  
  
* * *  
  
"...And Marko Lihari is still bitching that his shipment was three weeks late."  
  
"So he's refusing to pay again?" Jack watched her son nod, an angry glint in his eyes. "If that son of a bitch thinks he can use his family name on me, he's got a surprise coming. We've got to remind him just exactly what his reputation means around here." She typed a set of numbers into the calculator and cursed silently. The boys didn't need to know just yet how badly they needed that Lihari money. She'd have to find a way around this before Reg got back from Al-Walid City; she was tired of the boys complaining about her supporting too many other ventures on Eclipse.  
  
"You don't look so good, Mom."  
  
"Don't start with me, Martin."  
  
"When Reg gets back--"  
  
"I said don't start." She rose to her feet, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Put a hold on our Lihari accounts. They don't see a single bolt more of glow silk till they pay up." Jack smiled tiredly at her son. The twins looked so much like their father. "And make me up a plate, please. I'm eating downstairs tonight." Too much like their father.  
  
* * *  
  
The wind always came in from the southeast, as if the planet were heaving a perpetual sigh. The day Reg came home, though, the constant breeze had stopped. Anyone who'd lived long enough on the desert planet knew what the still air promised.  
  
Eclipse.  
  
It never failed to give Jack the jitters. She had always tried to be off planet with her family when the darkness came, even before Riddick was gone. This time would be different.  
  
The door burst open as though the silent wind had roared up into a gale. The man who stepped in could have been Riddick himself, twenty or thirty years younger--except that close-cropped dark hair grew from a head that should have been shaven clean; except that the chest was broader to accommodate lungs built to bleed every molecule of oxygen from the thin air; except that fifty years, real time, had passed since he last stood next to his father. Playing tricks with relativity had become a family tradition. His mirror image looked up from the table and grinned.  
  
"Where's Mom?"  
  
Jack came in from the other door. "Mom's been turning off the condensers so they won't overload once the rains start," she said. When Martin and Reg had grown too old to put up with maternal affection, she'd stopped giving them the hugs and kisses she'd once showered on them. Somewhere along the line, though, she had missed the fact that they'd gotten old enough to want that affection again. "You're late. Shut the door." She never liked that shade of blood the sky turned just before the third sun was hidden.  
  
"There's a delegation coming in from Darklin," Reg said.  
  
"When?"  
  
"Now. And they're not coming through Al-Walid spaceport." 


	2. The Unwelcome

II. The Unwelcome  
  
The ship that landed on the barren sands in front of them had nothing familiar about it. No running lights. No communications cluster. No viewports. It was matte black, blending perfectly into the darkness. Its configuration had never been seen before in this part of the galaxy.  
  
Not a human vessel.  
  
Jack thanked every god she'd ever heard of that she'd thought to don her glow silk dress. It would offer at least some protection from the creatures she knew would be debarking that alien ship. Behind her, Martin and Reg were also dressed in the softly glowing silk that was Eclipse's major export. The paired sounds of two shotguns being checked simultaneously was reassuring.  
  
"If these bastards make so much as one wrong move--"  
  
"We know, Mom."  
  
"Everything's fine. Don't worry about us."  
  
"It's not like we haven't heard--"  
  
"--all the stories before."  
  
Despite herself, Jack smiled. "Do you really have to do the duet thing right now?"  
  
"Well, we do come as a matched set."  
  
The conversation was cut short as the ship's hull split open with a metallic groan. The creature that came out was enormous. Jack was barely able to stifle her own gasp of shock--she'd forgotten how big the damn things could get--but by the muffled curse behind her, she knew her sons had underestimated what they'd been told. The misshapen hammerhead was followed by useless wings, folded limply against a grotesquely scarred body.  
  
It was unmistakable.  
  
"Ishmael." The woman who strode up beside the huge beast was also unmistakable, with her tawny, spotted skin. "And you must be Kat's daughter."  
  
"You've been in space flight too long and too often," the woman retorted, "if you haven't caught up on your timing. I'm her granddaughter, Clara." She grinned and spread her hands, matching the ceremonial greeting Ishmael also performed. Considering Clara's heritage--the claws peeking out of the fingertips, the fangs barely visible in the starlight--the polite threat was something more than implicit.  
  
Jack nodded curtly at the woman, and looked toward the beast, who was shying away slightly from the silken glow. "Welcome to the Red Cliff pueblo. I don't know why you're here, but you and your... people... are to stay out of populated areas." She began turning away, but stopped as too many years of slaughtering the feral monsters of Eclipse caught up with her. "Oh, and if you so much as 'look' at my sons, I'll kill you myself."  
  
A sharp cough turned her back for a moment. Ishmael cocked his massive head at her and chirred.  
  
It had been too long since Jack had heard that language; she looked at Clara questioningly.  
  
"He wishes to know where the man called Riddick is."  
  
Jack stared at her blankly for several seconds before answering. "Riddick is dead."  
  
Not looking back again, Jack made her way through the heavy night, back toward the carved cliffs that had become home. She needed to lean on Reg and Martin's arms before they made it even halfway there.  
  
* * *  
  
"Kill you herself, indeed," Clara scoffed. "Oh, I know, I remember what Grandmother said about her," she said as Ishmael's gnarled wings moved uncertainly. " 'All muscle, sinew, and attitude.' But she's so... ethereal."  
  
(I think it was not an idle threat,) Ishmael replied. (Do not underestimate her, my friend. Remember what became of the Lost Nest.) The sound of his useless wings rustling perturbed the night again. ('Red Cliff' is an apt name for this place. That woman has been long accustomed to sorrow.)  
  
Clara shrugged uneasily. Ishmael was one of the few winged ones who could speak with any authority about those emotions that were predominantly human. "All right, back to the ship. Why don't you tell the teams to start their scouting flights now. And we only have six weeks to work with, so make it single teams. I'll find His Nibs, make sure he leaves his Hawaiian shirts stowed. This is no tourist expedition.  
  
"And one more thing. Let them know: the first one to be spotted by a local gets a gut full of these." She held up one hand, claws unsheathed and glistening. 


	3. Skeleton in the Freezer

III. Skeleton in the Freezer  
  
It's not seeing the body that's so frightening. You have to see it every day, going downstairs into the stasis freezer to bring up food. You had to chain him to a couple of shelf brackets so he wouldn't hurt himself before you could turn the field back on. He's still there, after all these years, obscenely cruciform (where can I get eyes like that?) tucked into a corner fold in the stasis field.  
  
Initially, you thought just to keep him there until you found a doctor to fix him up. The research you've done, though, showed that to cure him would be to kill him. That's why what they did to him was so effective. So you keep him frozen in stasis, telling yourself it's because there's still hope left. There will be something, someday, if you can only last that long.  
  
How long has it been?  
  
At least you can reach the food. That corner, though, is the one section that can't be turned off just by opening a cabinet door. You've toyed, once or twice, with the idea of turning the whole field off, just long enough to see him move and breathe again. But the thought of watching him mindlessly trying to bash his own brains out is too much. His is the only part of the room that's out of reach.  
  
The boys know about him; how could they not? They never talk about him with you, though, or even with each other. That's why it's always you going downstairs. You're the one who has to look at him. But that's not so bad.  
  
No one else in the pueblo knows. No one else on the whole planet. All families have skeletons in their closets; yours has a husband, lover, father, killer stashed in the stasis freezer with the rest of the meat. Sometimes, there are still nights when you dream that his eyes are following you. It's not hope that makes you keep him there.  
  
You've been afraid of the dark for a long time.  
  
The dark of your windowless bedroom never bothered you, though, not while he still slept beside you. There's a fresh depression in the mattress shaped exactly like your body, but the bed is always empty. There are more pillows than one person should need, but none of them are ever warm, no matter how many times you turn them over. Night only comes once every twenty-two years on this hot world, but when it does, it lasts for six weeks. You've already been through one eclipse alone. You never thought you'd have to go through another one without him.  
  
Motherhood does strange things to a woman. Despair is out of the question when there's a family depending on you. Your sons are grown, now, but they still haven't left. Not that they can't, but they know that you need them to need you. When love is a vicious cycle, death is not an option.  
  
You can't remember the last time you changed the calendar.  
  
By now, you don't care anymore, because you've seen him so often. These days, time isn't what scares you. All you know is, you just have to stay alive long enough; so you take every interstellar flight you can, playing fast and loose with relativity; you jump ahead a few months here, a few years there, bringing your sons along to give the family more time. You try not to even think about what you're waiting for.  
  
It's the ID chip in his brain, the one all convicts have--the one that can never be removed. The only way the Orion Confederacy would grant him Primacy over this desert world was if he never left again. He never did, of course. It was you who left, you who took the shuttle up to the station, offloading the very first shipment of glow silk. No matter. All the computer saw was the surname "Riddick", and that was enough to blow the chip. You never reported it. No "Sorry, ma'am," necessary.  
  
It's not looking at the body that's so frightening. You've given up wishing he was still whole and alive. It's looking at him, and wishing that you could collapse to your knees and cry again; that you could still remember the feel of his skin; that you could bring up food for dinner with hands shaking again, instead of always steady. The day you looked at him and didn't feel a thing was the day you stopped sleeping with the light on.  
  
So one morning--early, before the boys have gotten up--you go downstairs, lock the door, and turn off the stasis field. The wound on his head is still raw, but you don't care. His skin is so warm, and his body remembers all the responses, even if no one's home. His first groan sounds like the rumble of thunder before the rains of the eclipse.  
  
He doesn't even try to hurt himself until you're done. 


	4. The Rain and the Night

IV. The Rain and the Night  
  
Geoff Ashbury mopped his forehead for the third time in as many minutes and cursed. Back in Al-Walid, he'd thought any society whose vices were not only allowed, but supported by the government (such as it was) must be quite advanced. Out here in the middle of nowhere, though, that same society wasn't looking so enlightened anymore.  
  
Damn it, couldn't these people at least install some sort of lift on the cliff face? Ashbury stopped to take several breaths from the rented aerator before trudging up the pueblo's next flight of stone steps. A report salvaged from the camp of a long-dead geological team showed that the sparse oxygen came mainly from some sort of airborne algae. Despite all evidence that showed the microbes to be benign, he still couldn't suppress a shudder at the thought of millions of the things invading his lungs with every breath. The fact that it was almost pitch black outside didn't help, either.  
  
He wouldn't be here at all, if it weren't for his latest contract. His mother had always told him to go to medical school....  
  
Clara Ibrahim had humiliated him--deliberately, he was sure--by walking in on his enjoyment of the planetary government's laxness. What was he supposed to tell the young lady he was "entertaining"? "Excuse me, my dear, but I've got to go see a man about a bug" just didn't live up to his stature, never mind that it wasn't the glow worms that he'd been contracted about. At least, not by those Darklings.  
  
Just who the hell was this Jack Riddick fellow, anyway? The last Riddick he'd heard of had died thirty-some years ago. Good riddance, too--except that this whole, hellish planet was now run by a government of Richard B. Riddick's making. The inanity of a galaxy, where a convicted mass-murderer could attain Primacy, never ceased to amaze him. Now, there was an entire world populated by every sort of scum from convicts, to dishonorably discharged ex-military types, to runaway slaves (freed now, due in large part to the Darklin Primacy debacle). He hoped every one of them enjoyed the climate as much as he did.  
  
Ashbury found the house he was looking for just as the rains started. The temperature began dropping sharply as soon as he was invited in.  
  
* * *  
  
Judith laced up her gauntlets with shaking hands. It didn't matter how often she flew with her teammate, it always terrified her. The fact that she'd given the creature the innocuous name "Rocky" didn't help--it was still forty feet of wings, claws, and teeth. She couldn't imagine what it must have been like for the victims of the Lost Nest; Judith, at least, was fairly certain Rocky wasn't going to eat her. Most of the time.  
  
They were late for their scouting patrol, but that was due to Clara's little brother, Abe. He'd managed to slip back into the control chamber, where Judith had found him, once again, hooked into the ship's sensory net. The ten-year-old spent all his spare time--and quite a bit that shouldn't have been spare--communing with both the ship and every winged one hooked into its operations; but he couldn't be bothered with talking to his own relatives. Judith knew she wasn't the only one to think something might be wrong with the boy.  
  
She slipped on her nightvision goggles before strapping herself lengthwise onto Rocky's harness. Moshe and Kat Ibrahim had thought their children might actually become a separate human species, but the felinoid woman's traits had, for the most part, not bred true. Only a few of their descendants, like Clara and Abe, had any of the ex-slave's genetic enhancements other than spotted skin. Judith would have gladly accepted her blemishes, if she'd been able to see in the dark.  
  
Tapping Rocky's wing shoulder to signal her readiness, Judith braced herself along the muscular back as the creature's wings cut through the rain and the night. This was why she submitted herself to the beast: at times like this, with the exhilaration of being effortlessly aloft, she could understand her young nephew's fascination with the ship's sensory net.  
  
They had been on the wing for only an hour or two when the booming call knocked them out of the air. Judith couldn't actually hear the infrasound that vibrated through her breastbone, but it was loud enough to stun Rocky. They fell in a barely controlled glide and landed in a spray of sand.  
  
* * *  
  
Its sensory horns still ringing painfully from the disorienting call, this one barely remembered not to shake the buzzing out of its head until its rider was free of the harness. The female was still strapped to its back, but by the feel of things, she was quickly working her way loose. As the phantom sound subsided, it heard Judith cursing and moaning softly. It turned one horn toward her, and heard the grating of bone on bone. A broken arm.  
  
Its own arm twitched in a sympathetic reaction. (This one expresses regrets for its rider's injury,) the one called Rocky said politely, but Judith made no reply; this one had never learned whether the female who had teamed with it had ever learned its language.  
  
Remembering its training, this one began scrutinizing its surroundings carefully; that disorienting cry had to have come from somewhere. Its sonar brought back the texture of sand and stone and metal; the olfactory patches on the roof of its mouth informed it that they were not alone. Judith stood shakily at its side. Her scent was suddenly pleased, despite her obvious pain.  
  
"We found it, Rocky!" She limped away toward the jagged maw that ripped open the hillside. "God, I hope we can--"  
  
Her voice ended in a strangled gasp as her scent of pleasure changed to one of blood. This one listened to the sound of feasting for a few moments, before turning away and launching itself back into the wind. Idly, it wondered whether the other humans would still call it "Rocky" when it returned. 


	5. Familiar Skies

V. Familiar Skies  
  
The thin, balding man had introduced himself as Geoff Ashbury. "I represent Clara Ibrahim and the Darklin delegation," he said over the glass of water Jack had offered him.  
  
Jack's polite smile froze.  
  
"Wait, let me explain. How much have you heard about the civil war on Janus?"  
  
Reg and Martin exchanged glances. "Been going on a while now, hasn't it?" Martin asked.  
  
Ashbury nodded. "The native Janites are rapidly losing both their land and their rights as the human colony expands. They dare not fight back physically, both because they are seriously outmatched for weaponry, and because it's becoming a war of propaganda. Now, strictly speaking, these... ah, people... do have the law on their side. What they don't have is popular support."  
  
"And this concerns us how?" Reg said. Jack glanced from him back to Ashbury, one eyebrow raised.  
  
"Well, not you, son," Ashbury replied. "It concerns your mother. Mrs. Riddick, as the only surviving Prime on Eclipse, you own all physical assets on the planet. Including, I might add, the ship that originally brought the kidnapped Janite nest here."  
  
Jack nodded in sudden comprehension. "You want to find it."  
  
"Oh," Ashbury coughed. "Not me personally, I'm only on retainer to Ms. Ibrahim and her friends. That... Ishmael--as a colonist Prime, it carries a great amount of influence, especially on its native planet, and for it to show evidence of a mass kidnapping of indigenous 'children' would go a long way to gaining the needed support."  
  
Jack poured herself a drink and sat back down at the table, ignoring Reg and Martin's questioning looks. She didn't like this Ashbury character; he smelled too much like old money and canned platitudes. He was dressed in a loose shirt and khaki trousers, but the way his hands kept trying to straighten a nonexistent tie said he was used to something more formal. She'd dealt with these legal types before, when Riddick's Primacy and her own were put through final confirmation; and again, later, when they set up their import/export business. If Ashbury was playing on only one team, she'd drink Riddick's entire stash of blood wine.  
  
As colonists and the descendants of colonists, Clara and her pet monsters had to be physically tough, especially after moving from one perpetually dark planet to another; but they were bound for a world of trouble now, if they actually took this guy at his word.  
  
Jack made a show of looking out the window, as if she were surprised at the storming night. "Mr. Ashbury, I'd be happy to lend whatever support I can to their cause." She smiled ingenuously. "Why don't you stay for dinner? I'll show you around the glow silk factory later; maybe you could help me out on an idea or three."  
  
* * *  
  
(We have found it.) Ishmael's useless wings waved through the air, scattering raindrops.  
  
"Where's Judith?" Clara asked him. "Why'd Rocky come back alone?"  
  
The gruesome head swayed in front of her. (She is dead. An accident. It is not important.)  
  
"What?! Bullshit, it's not important!" She took an angry step toward him. "Your teams don't go out again until I get an answer!"  
  
(You are out of order, nestling.) His breath washed over her, smelling of rotten meat. (Your humans will camp here, if they are all as poorly trained as that female was. This is our mission now.)  
  
"Ishmael--"  
  
Teeth as long as Clara's arm snapped closed inches from her face. (You would do well to learn what your grandmother knew: though I may understand human emotions, I do not share them, nor do my people. Remember that, before you speak to me again.)  
  
The monstrous frame lumbered back aboard the ship. A flight of forty unharnessed winged ones took off towards the northwest, leaving their erstwhile partners behind; the skies of Eclipse echoed again with familiar whoops and shrieks. Moments later, the ship followed. 


	6. Blood Wine

VI. Blood Wine  
  
Blood wine had begun as an experiment by some of the more creative--some said mad--colonists on Eclipse. After the rains of every twenty-second year, hordes of skim lizards appeared out of nowhere, gorging themselves on overripe suckleberries. Plump, drunken lizard bodies were plucked off the steaming ground everywhere and bled dry. The eventual result was one of the vilest, most potent brews known to man. The love-hate relationship that blossomed between blood wine and the heaviest drinkers grew legendary.  
  
Naturally, it became an offworld delicacy. On Eclipse, though, it quickly turned into one of those strange customs that new colonies always seemed to develop. A free glass of genuine blood wine was a mostly harmless joke played on tourists, just to see them cough and splutter; for newcomers to the colony, it was a test of mettle.  
  
The only people Jack had ever known to actually relish it were the Riddick males.  
  
So she realized, when Reg set a flask of blood wine at the dinner table, that it was going to be one of those nights.  
  
Reg and Martin both poured themselves generous glasses, and Ashbury followed suit. Jack wondered if he knew what he was getting himself into. She decided not to enlighten him; as every good Eclipser knew, amusement was the better part of valor.  
  
Martin shot Jack a surreptitious wink. "To our guest," he said, raising his glass. Returning the toast, Ashbury drank with what would have passed better as cultured taste, had he not turned thoroughly red in the face and green at the gills. It wasn't till the boys somehow manipulated the smaller man into downing the entire glass that Jack started to wonder what was going on.  
  
After dinner, Reg insisted that Jack leave the dishes till later. "We don't want to keep Mr. Ashbury waiting, Mom. I'm sure he's as eager to see your factory as you are to show it off." His grin was almost predatory.  
  
* * *  
  
The enormous cavern opening at the heights of Red Cliff, stocked with row up on row of hand looms of all sizes, led into miles of spidering tunnels, where the unwary could easily get lost.  
  
Even those ignorant of Eclipse's history would recognize that the place had not been built by humans; but inside the maze of tunnels, Jack was in her element. Having spent five years among the natives of Janus, she felt almost at home here. It was Geoff Ashbury who was lost in the muddle; and it didn't help that he was slightly more than tipsy.  
  
The wine the man had earlier imbibed meant he didn't notice the worm Reg plucked off the wall and dropped onto his shoulder. "Here, now, you've got one of them on your back, Mr. Ashbury," Reg said with false concern. He showed the worm, fat and wriggling, to their faintly disgusted guest, before carefully returning the creature to its nest.  
  
Jack bit her lip, trying not to laugh, and blithely continued the tour, pointing out more nests woven of the glowing silk the factory workers harvested. She was justly proud of this place; it was the very first of the now hundreds of factories where their major export was spun and woven. The word 'factory' was something of an overstatement, though. The highest example of technology was the metal flooring, charged with a very faint electrical field to keep the worms away from careless feet.  
  
The silk, Jack said, was used for clothing, but there were a few ongoing experiments to discover if it had any industrial uses. She asked Ashbury if he might know of anyone who could help with that sort of application, but he only gave a noncommittal shrug.  
  
Just before they left the tunnels, Martin brushed off Ashbury's back again with the same solicitude Reg had shown earlier. "Little buggers are tricky," he said. "They can drop on you, if you're not careful." This time, he hadn't even bothered with an 'offending' worm. What were they up to?  
  
It wasn't till after Ashbury left that they showed her their quick palm- copy of the man's ID card. Smart boys, she thought proudly. She hadn't been the only one to smell trouble.  
  
* * *  
  
Ashbury was drunk, and he was angry, and the former only aggravated the latter. Those Riddick boys were as juvenile as they were bullish; by the time the 'tour' was finished, he'd had more than enough of their childish pranks.  
  
Although he wasn't normally a drinking man (and he'd taken the ghastly stuff only to avoid insult) he had a moderately high alcohol tolerance. Instead of acknowledging his courtesy, though, the twins had done nothing but play immature games with him. To top it all off, that woman--and what kind of woman called herself 'Jack'?--had led him on a merry chase through the dirty, worm-ridden tunnels that she insisted on calling a factory. Those alien burrows gave him the chills.  
  
He chided himself for his irritable thoughts. After all, the silk was what he was really after, the Darklings only being a convenient cover. Jack Riddick had practically invited this, asking him about industrial uses and interested parties; as a matter of fact, he did know of someone very interested.  
  
Perched on the bed in the town's tiny excuse for an inn, ignoring his pounding head, he pulled out his pocket messenger. He knew the history of the Hunter-Gratzer crash--he had good reason. He knew that one Abu al- Walid had been involved, and was one of the discoverers of those damned glow worms. He also knew that al-Walid had once been on the payroll of the Tannerly pet business. After the laws changed, Tannerly Industries had been bought out by another family, one that Ashbury was now on secret (but only slightly illegal) retainer to. Alter a few records, and the majority of the glow silk stock could wind up in far different hands. It was the least he could do for his late uncle's memory.  
  
"Hello, Mr. Lihari," he typed in. "This is Geoffrey Johns-Ashbury. I have a proposition that may interest you...." 


	7. 'We Are Not Yet Dead'

VII. "We Are Not Yet Dead"  
  
Pounding on the front door brought Reg and Martin running from their beds. They opened the door on a tear- and rain-streaked Clara.  
  
"They've gone--they've gone, and they've got my little brother, and oh, God- -I don't know what they're going to do!"  
  
"Okay, slow down," Reg said, slipping one arm around Clara's shoulder, pulling her gently into the house.  
  
"One idea at a time," Martin added. "Punctuation counts." He poured Clara a glass of water and guided her to a chair.  
  
Grabbing the glass out of her hand, Reg deftly replaced it with a flask. "This'll help. Trust me."  
  
Obediently, she uncorked it and took a tentative swallow. Then another. "Wow," she said. "What is this?"  
  
Martin grinned. "I think I'm in love." Reg elbowed him to shut him up.  
  
"My little brother, Abe," Clara began after taking a deep breath. "Our parents are both dead, so I'm his guardian. He was still on the ship when Ishmael took off without us." She took another cautious sip, the flask in her hand shaking. Then, "They left us!" she blurted. "The winged ones all left! They're on the loose, and I don't know what they're going to do!"  
  
The twins shared a glance. "I'll get Mom," they both said at the same time.  
  
"Okay," Reg said. "You wake Mom up. I'll get Ashbury, see what he knows about all this."  
  
Within an hour, the house was a hive of activity. The constable had been and gone, and was now emptying the city's armory and doubling the watch. Reg had left with last minute instructions from Jack to send several of Clara's folk on up before hunting down Ashbury; Clara's statement that Ashbury was more trouble than he was worth was met with a trio of knowing grimaces.  
  
Jack next turned to Martin. "Go to your father's closet. Behind the bureau, there's a safe; the code is one-one-three-eight. Bring out everything that's in there. And be careful--it's been a while, so some of the grenades might be unstable when you move them."  
  
"Gee, thanks, Mom."  
  
Two hours later, the small army was ready to move.  
  
* * *  
  
The cavern was too small to be converted into another silk factory, but it had been marked on the map anyway. A few tunnels had been carved into the surrounding rock, though, as if someone had started to dig it out, but then given up. Glow worms sparkled on the walls here and there like oddly shaped Christmas lights. Geoff Ashbury began pulling them down, stuffing the wriggling things into the satchel slung over his shoulder. He would soon be off this godforsaken rock, taking along a very precious cargo. He'd had his orders from Marko Lihari; the glow silk monopoly was about to be broken.  
  
He cursed and dropped one of the worms. The damn thing had bitten him! Mandibles strong enough to chew rock had cut easily through the skin and flesh of his hand; drops of blood sprinkled the sand at his feet. He stomped viciously on the creature.  
  
All the worms from this cavern were in his bag now, but he wanted a few more, just to be sure. Taking out his penlight, he turned into one of the small tunnels; the walls were bare, but a faint rustling coming from around the bend convinced him that there were more of the little buggers to be had. The penlight slipped in his hand; he glanced down and saw that the bleeding hadn't stopped.  
  
In the faint illumination cast by his small light, the far wall looked to be moving and rippling. Another drop of blood hit the sand, and the wall burst into shrieking life.  
  
* * *  
  
"Well, he's not at the inn anymore. The manager said he'd checked out." Reg popped up the tabletop console. "Let's see what a satellite image will get us."  
  
A few keystrokes later, he and Martin were peering at a set of faint traces. "There!" Martin said. "Switch to infrared."  
  
"Yeah, I see it. What the hell's he doing in that cave?"  
  
Martin leaned in. "You know, I don't think he's moving."  
  
Reg focused the view closer. "Oh, shit."  
  
"Alas, poor Ashbury."  
  
* * *  
  
With the back seat stuffed full of weaponry, the airsled was only big enough to fit Jack and Clara. After telling Jack the coordinates of the site, the spotted woman had given orders to her people to divide themselves up: one group would follow them on foot, the other would give the constable reinforcements.  
  
Neither woman admitted that it would likely be too late for anyone to do anything.  
  
A chill crept up Jack's spine when they reached the ancient crash site. She'd been here before. Unconsciously, she rubbed her chest where, beneath her clothing, a series of angry scars still puckered her skin from her injury an eternity ago. No wonder they hadn't found the remains of the ship; Riddick had been half-crazed, with Jack near death.  
  
They moved quietly into what must have been a cargo bay, the only part of the ship to have survived. Jack couldn't see a thing, but the sense of something else present was almost suffocating.  
  
"Listen," Clara whispered, holding one hand up cautiously. "You hear that?"  
  
Jack nodded. It was the ship's voice log, stuck in play mode, repeating in an endless loop: a single "No!" followed by a warbling shriek.  
  
"Dear God," Clara breathed. "I thought it was only nestlings that were taken. That's an adult voice!"  
  
"What? What's it saying?"  
  
" 'We are not yet dead.' "  
  
* * *  
  
Reg and Martin stood over what remained of the body. The only thing that hadn't been touched was a satchel spilling over with glow worms.  
  
Looking intently at the body, Reg said, "You know what did this, right?"  
  
Martin nodded, wiping the rain out of his eyes. "I wish Dad was here." 


	8. The Prime

VIII. The Prime  
  
(We will not go back. We will not taint the people with our poison.)  
  
(Where is the poison in survival?)  
  
(I remember you now. You would speak of survival? I remember the taste of your pain when I took your wings and ruined your body.)  
  
(I remember also. That is a debt I have not yet repaid.)  
  
(Then kill me. Kill my nestlings.)  
  
(I will not.)  
  
* * *  
  
"Holy shit."  
  
"Yup."  
  
The twins had come back to Red Cliff looking for their mother; what they found was a city under siege. Lights had been extinguished almost everywhere. Monstrous silhouettes formed a living, breathing, whooping city wall. The only humans on the streets that Reg and Martin could see were the Darklings. It seemed that everyone else, all the citizens of Red Cliff, had barricaded themselves in their houses against the legend that had come back to horrific life.  
  
"So what do you think?"  
  
"I think there's gonna be hell to pay when Mom gets back here."  
  
"Goddammit, Martin, I'm serious!"  
  
Martin matched his brother's angry glare. "So am I."  
  
* * *  
  
(We carry the human venom.)  
  
(As do I: I am no stranger to their faults. What is to be done here now?)  
  
(We will carry on. We have no choice anymore.)  
  
* * *  
  
The monstrous guards at the pueblo's gate let a single man exit.  
  
"The Prime is going to supervise a new treaty," he said by way of greeting.  
  
"Where is she?" Reg demanded.  
  
Martin followed on his brother's heels. "Is she safe?"  
  
"Not your Prime," the man corrected them. "Ours."  
  
"What's all this?" Reg asked, motioning at the creatures standing watch over the city.  
  
"They've decided that the city isn't safe," the man replied with a hint of bitterness. "The other scouting party was restrained after you went out. No one's to enter or leave now, not till everything's sorted out."  
  
"You left," Martin pointed out.  
  
"No," the man said. "I didn't." He turned away then and walked back through the press of creatures, carefully not touching any of them.  
  
* * *  
  
Jack cursed herself for only bringing in a small torch, instead of a more dangerous light. At least she and Clara had brought rifles. But these creatures of Clara's were civilized--weren't they?--and she had to give them the benefit of the doubt. Didn't she? It's what Imam would have done, she told herself, if he were still alive.  
  
She wondered what Riddick would have done in this position, then shoved the thought away. Now was not the time for that.  
  
Ever since the two women had entered the vast cavern that had once been a cargo bay, a sense of presence had been pressing in on them. Now the presence had become almost suffocating.  
  
(We are here.) 


	9. The Hatred That Has Gone Before

IX. The Hatred That Has Gone Before  
  
I remember a time before fire, when there was nothing but the wind, the hunt, and the distant song of the stars.  
  
I was there when the humans first came--I remember the clamorous ship, the piercing lights, the eerie voices. They killed those that tried to defend themselves. Most of us fled then, but I hid. I can still hear the shrieks and cries of the nestlings they stole. They knew nothing of us, those humans. They underestimated us badly.  
  
* * *  
  
Abe was sweating and shaking when he woke up. He'd been having these awful nightmares lately--fire and pain and fear. So he did what he always did when he had a bad dream; he went to the nearest console on the ship and hooked himself into the sensory net. He knew immediately that there was no one else aboard. Not even Ishmael--now that was weird.  
  
Stretching his mind out along the ship's senses, though, he could feel that his friend wasn't too far away. That strange lady--Eclipse's Prime--was there; a little fuzzier, but that was just because Abe didn't know her. His sister Clara was there too, all raw uncertainty and distrust. She'd felt like that ever since Aunt Judith had died. Poor Clara; she just didn't get it: Ishmael and the others had never really cared that much about dying. Now she hung in Abe's extended senses like a ball of twine and fear.  
  
He still wasn't sure why Ishmael had kicked the other humans off the ship. It wasn't fair. Just because Clara was upset at him, that was no reason to leave her. But every time he'd tried to push into Ishmael's mind through the sensory net, his friend had just pushed him right back out. Abe had figured that there was something going on, though, so he'd tried a different tactic. While Ishmael was busy flying toward the big cave, Abe had tapped in--imagining his mind to be no bigger around than a length of string--and had come out just as quietly with an impression of concern for someone long lost.  
  
* * *  
  
When Ishmael materialized out of the darkness, Clara almost screamed out loud. What came out instead was a completely undignified squeak. Beside her, Jack looked like she wanted to laugh--if she herself hadn't been just as startled.  
  
(We are here,) Ishmael repeated, though Clara wasn't entirely sure he was talking to them.  
  
She screwed up her courage anyway, though, with an extra boost from her anger. "Ishmael, Judith was my sister. Why the hell did you say it wasn't important when she died?"  
  
(Death is not important to us. You fear losing yourself, but I can remember not having a self. It does not matter.)  
  
* * *  
  
I was a hunter then, and they could not see me. I was a hunter then, and I stole aboard their ship, thinking to take back the nestlings that were mine- -but I was taken, too. I was a hunter then, and so I hid and waited and observed.  
  
They practice cruelty, these humans, and call it knowledge. They kill each other and call it justice. They speak of the intangible and call it love, and they drape it in desire and fear so they can smell and touch and taste it. The nestlings and I, we murdered them one by one. We fed, and we were lost.  
  
The ship fell like a dying beast onto a planet of fire.  
  
* * *  
  
He tore off the sensory hood, gasping. There was something else out there now. But Ishmael had told the ship not to let Abe out. He tried to yell, tried to scream at Clara to run away, but it was useless. He hadn't really been floating disembodied over her shoulder; he was stuck in this ship, where she wouldn't hear him no matter how loudly he called. He'd tried to tell the ship to lift off, to fly closer to the cave where his sister was in so much danger, but it wasn't listening. Not to him, anyway.  
  
After a moment, Abe took a deep breath and pulled the hood back on. If the ship was holding him back, he would just have to go beyond the sensory net. He pushed out, then pushed even further. The mental bounds of the net stretched under his effort, then finally gave with an almost audible snap.  
  
* * *  
  
Clara's shoulders drooped. "Do you remember how you felt when Grandmother died?"  
  
Ishmael leaned back on his tail for a moment. Then his great head cocked to one side. (Hungry.)  
  
"Hungry? I don't understand."  
  
(Neither do--)  
  
The sonic attack came without warning, sending all three to the ground. Clara and Jack clutched at their ears. Blood vessels popped in their eyes and noses, and Ishmael shrieked in shocked fury. A crowd of winged ones crept out of the shadows to surround them.  
  
* * *  
  
We, who would stretch our wings to taste the sky, we burrowed in the earth like worms. With the blood of humans tainting us, we consumed each other, and we survived. I could have chosen the fire, but I chose to sleep instead. Three times over the long eons, I have dreamt the taste of human flesh, heard human voices speak in fear and pain.  
  
Now, I wake to the sound of an old companion speaking to me. It wears a name and calls the humans friends. The scars that cripple it are mine. I wake to find my nestlings' teeth wet with human blood again, and it is enough.  
  
The world has become a prison. Time is my hunting ground now. I am the hatred that has gone before, and I am the peace that comes after. Something new is drawing near, and I do not understand it. But I remember.  
  
I remember a time before the fire. 


	10. A Place Called Why

X. A Place Called Why  
  
When Ishmael materialized out of the darkness, Jack startled herself by almost laughing aloud at her companion's reaction. Poor Clara. She tried so hard to be a dignified representative of her people, but she was just so young. And she was certainly no Kat! Jack remembered the woman rather fondly, as the slave who had done what few others--if any--could. Kat had taken Riddick by surprise.  
  
(We are here.)  
  
Maybe the winged ones' language was coming back to her, or maybe it was just a fluke of memory, but she could at least understand that much-- although Clara's subsequent conversation with Ishmael was remarkably one- sided.  
  
Jack had just enough time to regret having slung her rifle back over her shoulder, before all hell broke loose.  
  
She could barely hear the call itself, but she could feel the sound pounding inside her head and into her bones. The pain of blood vessels bursting in her eyes and nose was almost completely drowned out by a ache in her head that was so intense she could see it. Jack heard Ishmael's outraged shriek (and how did she suddenly know he was outraged?) and felt his massive bulk overshadowing their helpless forms. Was he actually protecting them? She didn't have a chance to wonder further before the pain sent her mind spiraling away.  
  
* * *  
  
It had been a long time since Ishmael had fought. The nine savages crowding around didn't care, though. They simply wanted blood. Stepping over Clara and Jack's bodies, Ishmael mantled its misshapen wings and shrieked again. Then it stood on its tail, spreading its talons and revealing its shooting spines. Its ritual combat grin would have stopped any human heart.  
  
(I will kill them myself before I let you have them.)  
  
A long-forgotten instinct prompted the nine savages to return Ishmael's ceremonial greeting. Then they paused, listening to a faraway voice.  
  
(Then kill them,) came the Elder's reply. (They are only humans.)  
  
Ishmael lowered itself back down again. It circled each neck with its talons.  
  
* * *  
  
(Who are you?)  
  
When Jack lost consciousness, she found herself in a world of gray mist. It swirled and danced in hypnotic eddies, captivating her attention, curling and twisting in an echo of the question. The voice wasn't human. Jack wondered how she could be understanding it; as if in answer, she caught a glimpse through the mist of a boy sitting alone, his eyes closed, lips moving slightly. Somehow, this was his doing.  
  
"I'm Jack," she replied. "Who are you?"  
  
(I am the hatred that has gone before,) the voice said. (I am the peace that comes after. I am the Elder.)  
  
"I don't--"  
  
(Understand. Yes, I know. Something new is coming. The boy--he is the first of his kind. He is a bridge between us.)  
  
"Where am I?" Jack said. "And come to think of it, where the hell are you?"  
  
('Where' is not important. This place is 'why'.)  
  
* * *  
  
Ishmael felt the life beating under its talons. If it struck, that life would seep into the earth below. It remembered Kat's empty body and withdrew.  
  
(I cannot kill them.)  
  
(They are only humans.)  
  
(They are not beasts. Nor am I. And I do not wish to feel that hollow hunger, that emptiness, again.)  
  
(We will think on this,) the Elder said, and the nine withdrew from hearing.  
  
Ishmael found itself on the verge of collapse. How odd. It laid itself down carefully, gathered Clara into its arms, and covered Jack with one misshapen wing. And it waited.  
  
* * *  
  
Reg and Martin had found the alien ship easily enough, but none of the hatches would open. "I have a feeling," Reg said, "that it doesn't want to be entered."  
  
"How can a ship want or not want?" Martin demanded. Reg only shrugged.  
  
The airsled Clara and their mother had taken was parked next to the cavern entrance. Neither one could figure why the women would have left all the weaponry untouched.  
  
"Hear that?" Martin asked. The voices were coming from inside the cave. They ran inside and stopped short. "How the hell...."  
  
"I don't know either," Reg said.  
  
They had understood what Ishmael was saying. Martin put a hand to the side of his head, somehow knowing that Reg was feeling the same thing. An image grew in their mind, a picture of miles and miles of tunnels and caverns, far beneath the planet's surface. Creatures lived down there, creatures that his parents had thought they'd exterminated. There was enough life down there for them to feed and subsist, but they wanted more. They wanted to live, not just survive.  
  
Reg watched along with his brother as the creatures living far below passed a new idea among themselves. Would this new thing work? Would the humans-- their ancient enemies--let it happen? They mulled the possibilities over-- and the whispers turned into murmurs, then to a chorus of agreement, and at last to a whooping, shrieking song, as thousands flew en masse out of their hidden underworld home. The skies of Eclipse were full again.  
  
* * *  
  
Clara woke in Ishmael's arms. It was the strangest feeling, to be held by a being that could as easily kill her as speak to her. She stroked the rough, scarred skin, and Ishmael bent his head down to her.  
  
(Something is happening,) he said. (Listen.)  
  
"What's happening? I don't hear anything."  
  
(Listen deeper.)  
  
"Abe??" Clara said in surprise. Bright blue laughter answered her. "What-- "  
  
(There is something new coming,) Ishmael said. (We are all changing, Clara.) And then he laughed, too.  
  
"But you can't laugh!" she protested. "And you've never been able to pronounce my name!"  
  
(Kat and I were the first. We understood each other. Now there will be more.) His voice held an irresistible smile.  
  
Clara smiled back, though she still didn't completely understand; but with teeth as long as her arm only inches away, she relaxed into the coils of her dragon.  
  
* * *  
  
Jack had spent five years among these creatures, while she and Imam were living on Janus. The winged ones had a rich tradition of telling stories. One of those tales suddenly sprang to mind. The Oldest One, she remembered, was supposed to have fallen asleep thousands of years before, but would one day return. Jack had always thought the winged ones' first colony ship, the Oldest One, fulfilled that prophecy nicely.  
  
Now she wondered, though: what if it wasn't just a story? Although Jack had seen younger creatures die of disease and injury--she'd caused plenty of those injuries herself!--she'd never seen the corpse of an old one. Did they ever die of old age? Or did their bodies eventually slip into eons of slumber, like the mythical Oldest One, leaving their minds to wander free?  
  
Something moved through the mist, as if nodding in assent.  
  
"All right, then," Jack pressed. "I'll bite. Why?"  
  
(Why are you here? What do you want?) the Elder asked. The gray mist pressed around her, like a purring cat asking to be fed.  
  
Three times, Jack almost answered, but she stopped herself each time. This 'Elder' person didn't want the obvious answer. "I don't want to be afraid of the dark anymore," she finally said.  
  
(What else?) Tendrils of mist touched her face, like the kisses of a lover.  
  
"And... and I want my husband back." She sank down to a nonexistent ground. "I want Riddick!" 


	11. Not For Me

XI. Not For Me  
  
Jack woke up to a familiar face. "Riddick!"  
  
Dark, unreadable eyes blinked; lips moved in a rumbling response. "No, Mom, it's me. Martin. You gotta come out of it now."  
  
She looked at her son uncomprehendingly for a moment, before sitting up so fast it made her head spin. "Goddammit. Goddammit, you son of a bitch." Martin backed up in surprise as Jack got up and staggered drunkenly toward Ishmael. Her short, three-way communing with the boy and the Elder had answered more questions than she'd thought to ask. "You selfish prick! You fucking asshole! You and your fellow dickless wonders came here just to rescue that... that...." She stopped not two inches away from the sightless face, spitting like a cat. "You came here on a fucking mercy mission?!" she shrieked. "What, was your brain so far up your ass, you didn't think about anyone else?" She actually reached out and grabbed hold of Ishmael's sensory horns, her mind briefly flashing on a memory of Riddick in the same position. "You do not know who you're fucking with!"  
  
Somewhere in the back of her mind, Jack knew that Ishmael was getting more than just her words--but she didn't want to think about that, any more than she wanted to think about what those words were revealing about herself. "What about my fucking Primacy? What about all the people on this planet who depend on me? What about every goddamn thing Riddick and I fought and bled for?" Her voice finally broke on the last words. Clara tried vainly to peel Jack's fingers off of Ishmael, while Reg and Martin stood helplessly behind her.  
  
It was Reg who finally said it. "You've gotta let him go, Mom.... You've gotta let Dad die."  
  
Jack let Ishmael loose, realizing it wasn't the winged one she was hanging onto. She took a deep breath, trying to compose herself, while Clara made work of checking Ishmael over.  
  
"I know," she said softly. "I'll do it. Just--stay out of the basement, okay?" She smoothed down her hair and clothes, her hands frantic to hide their shaking. "I'll do it--not you. You kids shouldn't have to watch your father die."  
  
* * *  
  
Ishmael pulled out of Clara's ministering touch. It wished... it wished-- for what? (Oh, my long-lost Kat,) it thought. (What color would such mourning be?)  
  
It took a few uncertain steps toward Jack and her nestlings. The woman's emotions had lashed into its scarred hide like a heated whip. It had no desire to feel that lash again--but now the welts were caused by its own mind. (This one regrets this one's actions,) it said, abasing itself the only way it knew how. (But you do not have to worry.)  
  
"That's right," Clara agreed. Jack looked at them both as if she thought they were crazy.  
  
(We must be mad,) Ishmael thought to itself. (I must be. To have overlooked the humans' emotions thus--we will be lucky if there is only war.)  
  
"After the slaves and the winged ones earned Primacy on Darklin," Clara explained, "the Dens got their revenge the only way they could. They lobbied hard enough and long enough that the Orion Congress finally passed a law regulating Primes. If a Prime colony drops below eighty percent of optimal population, the Prime loses title, holdings, and assets, which revert to an unclaimed state." She smiled ruefully. "Guess they didn't think we'd last. They even made the law retroactive, so it wouldn't look like they were going after us specifically." She didn't say that it shouldn't have been news to Jack; there hadn't been room for politics in the older woman's life for a long time.  
  
Jack stared open-mouthed at Clara a moment longer. "Ishmael, you wanted me to sign a treaty, right?" When Ishmael made a remarkably human nod of assent, she continued. "Then we'd better get to it. We'll have to make sure your cousins have full rights and responsibilities."  
  
Ishmael didn't argue further, nor did Reg, Martin, or Clara. A mutual feeling hung in the air: none of them wanted to remind Jack of the sad duty that waited for her.  
  
* * *  
  
Somewhere within the confines of a not-quite-sentient ship, a ten-year-old boy slept quietly. At the roots of the earth, an ageless memory stirred, but did not waken. The boy had grown invisible wings so large they blotted out the stars; he flew unnoticed over wastes and gullies, dunes and hidden oases, abandoned camps and cities bursting with life. The unseen creature walked earthbound over earth so thirsty it had cracked, beneath a sky that had not wept in a generation. But the floodgates were open now.  
  
Wherever each one walked or flew, stories that had once been told to frighten children were laid to rest, and new ones sprang to fresh, green life over the old. The long dark that had formerly been a time of fearful remembrance gradually took on a merrier air. Where bright lights used to burn, now soft candles flickered harmlessly. Locked doors were flung open, and offerings of meat and friendship were set out for deadly visitors.  
  
In the Red Cliff pueblo, the humans and winged ones of Darklin became partners again for the first time. What had started as a forced symbiosis turned finally to mutual trust and even affection. Some of the townspeople braved the rain long enough to set out a tarp over the town square. Before long, meat and drink appeared; musicians conjured instruments, and no one seemed to mind that the eerie whoops and wails weren't in tune.  
  
There was only one house in the city that was completely dark.  
  
A silent presence drifted through the pitch black rooms. Walls were no barrier, but it stopped short at the lowest room in those dim quarters.  
  
(Hello, old friend.) The Elder considered the stasis field for only a moment before it struck. (We have a score to settle, you and I.) 


	12. The Animal Side

XII. The Animal Side  
  
The house is dark when you finally come home, the shadow crawling through the rooms like a living thing. For a moment, you fancy that the blackness itself has a heartbeat, until you realize the pulse thrumming in your ears is your own.  
  
You've waited longer than you ever thought you would, and even though you never stopped wishing he was still whole and alive, someday never came. For the first time you can remember, you don't want to see him move and breathe, because it will be for the last time. You look at the hypospray in your hand and toy with the idea of using it on yourself. But motherhood has done strange things to you.  
  
At the basement stairs, you stop. It's not the thought of seeing the body that's so frightening.  
  
Someone pulls the hypospray out of your hand. It's Martin. He and Reg walk down the dark stairs together. You know what they're doing, of course. Always looking out for their mother; they know how much you need them, especially now that death is the only option left.  
  
Soon, the whole pueblo will know--the whole planet. It's you that's waiting, though, frozen, for the sound of the stasis field shutting down. It never comes. Instead, it's Martin's startled yell that brings you running down the stairs.  
  
You've dreamt almost every night that his eyes are following you. But this is no dream. He is a stone statue, the same as last you saw him, except that those shined eyes are open now. How did they open? When? How could they, with the field on?  
  
"Turn it off," you say.  
  
And he looks at you. Two flecks of silver nail you to the opposite wall. You barely even hear Reg's voice saying that the field was already off when they came in.  
  
"Unchain me." You've forgotten how deep his voice is, like the rumble of thunder before the rains of the eclipse. "Now."  
  
The hypospray is in Reg's back pocket, where Riddick can't see it. Wise move.  
  
"Get out, boys." The twins look back at you hesitantly, but with another jerk of your head, they leave. Those glinting eyes follow them all the way out. You can't quite tell in the dimness, but you think that's a smile playing across his lips. Yes, Riddick, you think. They grew up.  
  
"Unchain me," he says again.  
  
You unlock his left hand first. As soon as his arm is free, Riddick pins you to his chest. You find yourself straddling him.  
  
"How...?" It's the only thing you can think to say.  
  
His eyes follow your hands as you lean over to unchain the other wrist. "Don't know. But something was in here." The right arm joins the left, locking you in place. "I can't even feel where the chip was anymore."  
  
It's only then that you notice the wound on his head is almost healed, too. You reach up to touch it, but he grabs your wrists tightly.  
  
"I hate being chained up," he growls. "I hate being in cryosleep. The only part that's awake is the animal side." He drops your hands gently, and holds you again. "You're cold," he says, and you are. But then he says something that makes you flush all over. "I think I can be an animal for a little bit longer."  
  
You smile and slap his chest playfully. "In your dreams, flyboy."  
  
"Exactly." 


	13. The Peace That Comes After

XIII. The Peace That Comes After  
  
Ishmael waited in silence as Abe hooked it into the ship's sensory net in preparation for flight. Normally, this was Clara's duty, but its relationship with Kat's granddaughter was still somewhat strained. Ishmael wondered how it could have ever been so foolish as to think it understood her. Its own body was riddled with physical scars--but the human heart never mended as quickly as external wounds.  
  
A pair of small arms encircled Ishmael's neck. It was an entirely human gesture, but Ishmael welcomed the sentiment.  
  
"She'll be okay, I promise," Abe said.  
  
The boy wasn't wearing a sensory hood, Ishmael noticed, yet he still knew the path the winged one's thoughts were taking.  
  
"I don't need the sensory net anymore," he said, reading his friend again. "Maybe someday, you won't, either."  
  
(This is a strange thing that has happened,) Ishmael replied, not quite sidestepping the subject. (There is still much work to be done between winged one and human.) It wondered, too quietly for Abe to hear, whether it was only speaking about the two species in general.  
  
"How long do you think it'll take?"  
  
(Many years. Perhaps centuries. But someday, there will be an understanding between us, nestling. It has already begun.)  
  
For a moment, Ishmael's scarred wings ached again, echoing that distant conflict that had changed its life. Perhaps, it thought, it is not only human hearts that are slow to heal.  
  
* * *  
  
"Where will you go now?" Martin asked.  
  
"To Janus, then back home again," Clara replied with a smile for his reluctance. The revelry in the pueblo was still going on, with the restored Riddick family at the center of the celebration. All but Martin. He'd come out to wish them good journey, as they were leaving before the suns rose.  
  
Clara readjusted the harness strap on Rocky's back for the third--or was it the fifth?--time, her smile widening at her own unwillingness to leave. "Ishmael may have had ulterior motives for coming here," she continued, "but the rest of us didn't. We've got more than the kidnappers' ship logs now--we've got the Elder's testimony." She gave a theatrical sigh. "It's just too bad Mr. Ashbury won't be there to witness the charges we're bringing against the government of Janus."  
  
Martin laid a hand on one of Clara's fumbling ones. "How's Abe?"  
  
She ran her free hand through her hair. Why couldn't she stop fidgeting? "A little shaken up. Pretty tired. But he'll be fine. None of the winged ones can sense that there'll be any problems with taking him home, and we don't anticipate any trouble with separating him from the Elder." Great. Now she was babbling.  
  
"What about you?" Martin's hand still hadn't moved from Clara's.  
  
"What about me?"  
  
"What'll you do when you get back to Darklin?"  
  
Clara looked from Rocky's harness up at Martin. When had he stepped that close? "I--" she began, but stopped, flustered. She tried again. "I don't know. There's so much work to be done now, everything's different, we don't even know if the change has reached all the way home yet, or--"  
  
"Clara."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Shut up."  
  
She was barely aware of Rocky's laughter floating at the back of her mind as Martin Riddick kissed her thoroughly; nor could she have said how long it lasted--the kiss or the laughter. He tasted like fresh grass in the springtime, and a bit like the blood wine the Riddick men liked so well.  
  
"Maybe you'll be back someday," he murmured against her lips.  
  
She smiled, and felt his mouth do the same. "You know, I think maybe I will."  
  
And this time, their kiss wasn't broken again until the first warnings of the sunrise.  
  
End. 


	14. Epilogue

Epilogue  
  
Marko Lihari stepped off the commercial transport onto pavement so hot the soles of his shoes almost melted. Donut-shaped clouds of airborne sand whirled away at the southern horizon; the distant formations of the capitol city of Al-Walid wavered and danced.  
  
At this time of day, all three suns were visible. The enormous black Dome at the center of the city had been built while Marko was still in transit. Now complete, it shattered the triple sunlight into colors never seen before by human eyes.  
  
There were now six major Domes across the planet (a tourism brochure declared) with plans for one to be erected in every settlement by the end of the century. The Domes, the pamphlet boasted, were the future of the economy and society of Eclipse: they were the newest glow silk farms and factories, guarded by the utmost in security. They represented a peaceful life for all the citizens of Eclipse.  
  
Marko joined a tour headed for what was said to be the largest and most magnificent of all Eclipse's Domes, situated on what used to be the outskirts of Red Cliff pueblo.  
  
He'd left Earth as soon as he'd heard from Geoff Ashbury--or, rather, not heard. Instead of contacting his employer--Lihari Industries--with word that he'd procured a sample, the little man had simply vanished. Marko cursed him for making the heir to the Lihari estate into a walking cliche. "If you want something done right," he muttered, "you have to do it yourself." Lihari Industries had to have its own glow worm breeding population. The naturally incandescent fibers had far more lucrative uses than simply exotic garb.  
  
By the time the airbus pulled up to the Red Cliff Dome, only the blue sun was still visible. The natural pigmentation in the cliff side that had given the city its name had faded in the harsh light to a washed-out purple. No wonder these people wore such loud clothing--the colors shifted, depending upon the time of day.  
  
He had sand in his shoes almost as soon as he stepped off, and nearly removed them before realizing that his feet would be scorched. How, he wondered, could any form of life, much less human life, bear this hellhole of a world?  
  
Before entering, Marko glanced again at the brochure. The map of the city and Dome indicated underground tunnels and caverns. Further notations stated that these subterranean passages actually honeycombed the entire planet's crust, and were all interconnected. Were the worms that plentiful? He bit his lip in disgust. The greedy bastards were probably hoarding the best product, giving the rest of the galaxy short shrift. What the hell would Eclipsers need the glow silk for, anyway? Night came only once a generation.  
  
Once inside, the tour group stopped to let their eyes adjust to the sudden darkness. Marko followed the group for about half an hour, only half listening to the guide's explanations about breeding, farming, and weaving. Before long, though, he managed to drop back to the rear of the group, finally ducking away into a side passage.  
  
The innards of the Dome were a labyrinth. Earthen walls had been carved in mind-bending patterns, weaving randomly. Above, the ceiling stretched so high it was all but invisible; wisps of vapor showed that the Dome even had its own weather. Strange whoops and chirrs sounded overhead. Perhaps the Eclipsers chose to shelter some of the indigenous life forms in the cool, dark Domes. The walls themselves were littered with glowing worms. When he stopped to listen, he could hear the faint scratching sound of their feeding.  
  
It wasn't long before Marko admitted to himself that he was lost, and began looking around for wall maps or directions. But he found only one sign:  
  
"Hive Only: Do Not Enter."  
  
He grinned. This was obviously what he wanted. The worms scattered on the walls were pretty enough, but he wanted breeders. He wanted to take a nest. He even had a camera case to stash the little buggers in; the case itself gave off false imagery under X-rays. He'd used it before, for other types of... information gathering.  
  
Hive only? Perfect. This had to be where the breeders were being kept. He ducked into the tunnel and descended. There were more worms, all right, but still no nests. He kept walking. When he finally did come upon a nest, though, it wasn't exactly what he was looking for. Only then did he realize that it might not be breeding season--at least, not for the worms.  
  
Fist-sized ovules were arranged in a hexagonal pattern, secured to the wall by some kind of gooey secretion. Inside the translucent membranes, barely visible embryos twitched and shifted. Marko stopped cold. He'd studied the aliens that had broken his family's slave trade long enough to know a Janite nest when he saw one. Glow worms crawled over the eggs, but the fetuses didn't seem to be harmed by the light. They were breeding the damn things--raising them to be immune to light.  
  
"What the hell do these idiots think they're doing?" he whispered.  
  
"Protecting our interests." The rumbling voice came from nowhere and everywhere. Marko straightened so fast, he lost his balance; he reached out to steady himself against a wall that suddenly wasn't there anymore. Instead, it was living, breathing flesh. A hammerheaded nightmare grinned and spread its talons. Marko snatched his hand back, surprised to still have the appendage.  
  
Again that voice, just loud enough to be heard, just low enough to be felt. "We've had our eyes on you for a while now, Mr. Lihari." The creature chirred, and the voice laughed darkly. "Well, so to speak." From behind the maniacally grinning beast stepped the one of the largest men Marko Lihari had ever set eyes on. His head was shaven clean, and his eyes shone in the dim light like a cat's. "And like I said: we," and he looked almost affectionately at the beast, "are protecting our interests."  
  
Marko raised his chin, preparing to unleash the full consequences of his name and his power. "Just who the hell do you think you are?" he demanded.  
  
The man scratched the monster behind one sensory horn. It all but purred in appreciation, then snapped its bone-white teeth at Marko.  
  
"Richard B. Riddick," came the response. "Escaped convict. Murderer.  
  
"Prime."  
  
  
  
End. 


End file.
